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I've invested in Vanguard mutual funds, mostly index funds since 1990 soon after college: Index 500, Total Stock Market, Tax Managed Capital Appreciation, Tax Managed Small Cap, and Healthcare funds.According to their charts, my portfolio has earned 13.3% per year over the last 10 years. That includes some individual stocks but the bulk (and best performing) are the mutual funds.Vanguard charts don’t go back more than 10 years, otherwise, it’d show the 2008 financial crisis crash.I have a taxable account, 401K, IRA and ROTH IRA. For the taxable fund, I use the Vanguard Tax Managed Capital Appreciation fund. I also have the mid-cap and small-cap funds. All my funds have automatic reinvestment. About $1.8 million in my 401K, $600K in my IRA, and $4 million in my personal account to add up to the $6.3 million in the chart.Note, there were no advisor fees paid. I just did this on my own.The $470K addedThe chart indicates $470K in purchases during this period. I added close to the max 401(k) each year which got a partial match from my employer, so probably around $250K and another $20K a year saved.NOTE: An earlier graph I presented showed a $1 million investment over this period. Upon further research, that included $600K in December that was unrelated to mutual funds, so I updated the graph and numbers here.2000’s Went Nowhere. Stayed the CourseThere was around $1 million after 9/11 in 2001. It was dead money until the depths of the 2008 financial crisis where I had around $1.5 million (but I also added 401K investments all those years after 9/11). It didn't look good then, but I didn't change any investments and stayed all equities. The performance is pretty much inertia. There were very few changes other than exchanges from Investor to Admiral funds.So overall, the $1.5 million 10 years ago plus another $470K, round up to $2 million total, turned into $6.3 million. Holy crap! That’s $4.3 million that just showed up.Can’t Believe My Wife has a $500+K PortfolioMost surprising (not in the chart), my wife has over half a million in her rollover IRA from the 10 years she worked at non-profits before becoming a stay at home mom for over a decade. Her investments from late 1990s haven't changed since they were deposited from her pay checks and were entirely in mutual funds: Vanguard and Fidelity Contrafund.Kids’ College Funds Jumped UpWe also have over $400K in two Vanguard Tax Managed Capital Appreciation funds for our kids' college education. We put in about $100K each in the early 2000s, and they’ve grown from there.The first one is graduating and still has $150K in it. Did not plan to have so much excess after spending $70K a year for her education. In 2008, the fund only had $70K, so it looked grim, since after a decade, the $100K lost $30K. Not good.But it tripled by the time she started college in 2015 to $200K. Then every year under the Trump presidency, it essentially earned one semester. We paid another $100K while she was in college (since the $200K we started with didn’t seem enough). The fund now has $150K and she’s about to graduate. So we invested $200K out-of-pocket, paid full price for four years of an Ivy League college, and are left with $150K making the net cost $50K. Didn't expect it would work out so well. 4 years ago, I expected to use all of it and go out of pocket.The other education fund has $270K with three years left. If the market holds up, it should be more than needed. We have $50K left in a 529 plan funded in Vanguard Stock Fund, so that's close to a year of college.I added a new article to show what happened in our investment for college where the returns were an even better 16.8% over the past decade:Someone anonymous's answer to How many years have you invested in mutual funds and what is your average return in those years?All US Equities; Home is the BondWe're entirely in US equity funds the whole time. No bonds. Paid off our home mortgage, so we consider that the bond portion of our portfolio.The power of time and compound interest is incredible. So for a few of the last few years, our Vanguard accounts grew $1 million. I guess it averaged about $400K a year over the last 10. That compares to my salary of around $125K/year with some bonuses here and there. Fluctuations of $50K or more a day is normal. Just unbelievable. Never expected this. Very blessed. Really makes my job a hobby.We traded off some short term pleasures many years ago for long term financial security and peace of mind forever. Really don't feel we sacrificed that much. My wife and I come from lower middle class upbringings, so our expenses were never extravagant even as our wealth increased. We never revolved our credit card balances or incurred car loan debt. We paid off our student loans early. We haven’t tapped any of our stock market investments for our personal lives, though we mentioned the $100K for our child’s tuition.Doubt we'll be able to spend it all in our lifetimes. We are thinking about that now that we're approaching our mid 50s. We’ve setup a Vanguard Charitable Trust that we can transfer appreciated stocks and funds to use for donations while getting a tax deduction.Still love our work: computer programming for me, school teacher for her. Not sure how long we’ll keep that up. In most years, we are earning less than our portfolio so it’s good that we still enjoy our work and making a positive impact on others.Hope this lets you know mutual funds can work for you.

I agree with the answers given by Siddharth Biswal and Paul Devlin. It really depends on how much time and effort you are willing to put into managing your portfolio. I have been studying the stock market and investing in individual stocks for over twenty-five years. My various investment accounts were valued at $1,515,759.01 at yesterday’s market close (Friday, February 21, 2020).I spend at least 8–12 hours per week managing my accounts. If you are unwilling or unable to put that much time and effort into managing your investment accounts, then just read the section below titled The Couch Potato Investment Strategy. Otherwise, read on.I started an IRA in the 1980s with Fidelity, investing in Fidelity mutual funds. I joined an investment club in the early 1990s to learn how to invest in individual stocks. I started out with a traditional, full-commission stock broker, who was also the broker for the investment club. I also invested in individual stocks through company-sponsored Dividend Reinvestment Plans (DRIPs) offered through the investment club’s membership in the National Association of Investment Clubs (NAIC), and later opened an online investment account with E*TRADE.One day, around the year 2000, my broker called me and tried to pressure me into investing in some sort of investment that had a very high commission. He was angry that I wasn’t interested and told me that I had to decide if I was with him or not. He sounded like an abusive boyfriend. I immediately opened more online accounts and transferred all my brokerage accounts to E*TRADE and have been managing my own investments since then. I’ve made my share of mistakes, and learned from them. Let’s first discuss The Couch-Potato Investment StrategyThe Couch Potato Investment StrategyIf you don’t wish to invest the time and effort that it takes to manage a portfolio of individual stocks, do the following:If you don’t have any investment accounts already, open a Roth IRA and a non-IRA “Brokerage” account with an online investment site like E*TRADE, TD Ameritrade, Charles Schwab, etc. I’m partial to E*TRADE, but I’ve been an E*TRADE customer for around 25 years (this is not a paid endorsement, I just like them).Contribute the maximum amount allowed by law every year to your Roth IRA, and as much as you can afford in your non-IRA Brokerage account.If you have a 401(k) through your employer, contribute as much as you can afford, or at least up to the amount that your company offers as a “match” to your contributions.Invest everything in your accounts in some sort of S&P 500 Index mutual fund or an S&P 500 Index ETF. Your 401(k) plan should have an S&P 500 Index mutual fund as an investment option in the plan. Look for an index mutual fund with no-load and a low expense ratio. I’m partial to Vanguard 500 Index Fund Admiral Shares (VFIAX), but there are plenty of other no-load, S&P 500 Index Mutual funds with low expense ratios.An ETF is like a mutual fund, except it trades just like a stock on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and doesn’t have the minimum opening investment requirements that are typical for mutual funds. I am partial to Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (NYSE: VOO) and SPDR S&P 500 Trust ETF (NYSE: SPY), but there are many others.If you don’t do anything with your 401(k), it will be invested in a “default” fund, which may be a money-market account. This is the worst possible option. There will be contact information for your 401(k) plan administrator. The contact person for the plan can outline your investment options within the plan. If you are a couch-potato investor, direct all contributions to the S&P 500 Index fund option.In your online accounts, there will be a toll-free number to call and someone can walk you through how to buy and sell stocks in these accounts. The couch-potato investor should invest everything in an S&P 500 Index ETF.If you have old 401(k) accounts with prior employers, open an IRA Rollover account with your online brokerage, then contact the plan administrator for the old 401(k) plans and direct them to do a DIRECT ROLLOVER to your new, online IRA Rollover account. DO NOT have your old 401(k) plans send you a check, because they may be required to take out taxes on a full disbursement. With a direct rollover it goes directly to your new account, you never touch the money, and taxes will not be withheld. If you are a couch-potato investor, invest all funds in an S&P 500 Index ETF.Automatically reinvest all dividends in all of your accounts. The plan administrator for your 401(k) plan, or your online account help desk can help you with this.If you are a couch-potato investor, continue to invest the maximum allowed contribution to your Roth IRA and 401(k), but otherwise ignore your accounts (that’s why it’s called the Couch-Potato Investment Strategy). Look at your final account statement of the calendar year and compare it to the final account statement for the previous year.If your account balance is LOWER or little changed from the prior year, DON’T PANIC. Just stick with the plan, continue to invest, and look at your end of calendar year statements next year. If the stock market is down on any year, it just means that your reinvested dividends are buying shares at bargain-basement prices which will achieve greater capital gains when the stock market recovers.The Dividend Growth StrategyI invest in individual stocks using what is called the Dividend Growth Strategy. It works almost exactly the same as the Couch-Potato Strategy, but, instead of buying S&P 500 Index Mutual funds or S&P 500 Index ETF shares, I research and invest in individual, dividend-paying stocks. I focus on stocks that have a 3–5% dividend yield with a long history of paying dividends without interruption and a long history of regularly increasing (growing) their dividends. These stocks are often called “Dividend Aristocrats.”Because I’m retired, I can’t contribute to an IRA or 401(k); but, my portfolio of dividend-paying stocks generates around $60,000 in dividends annually. I have enough retirement income that I don’t need to use these dividends for living expenses. But, I have to invest around $5,000 in dividends each month. So I spend 8–12 hours each week researching individual stocks to buy with my dividends.I have been very successful investing in individual stocks, but that doesn’t mean that everyone will be as successful. If you are unable or unwilling to invest the time and effort to research individual stocks, you may want to pursue the Couch-Potato Strategy. I enjoy doing the research and buying stock, but others may not. If I ever find it too burdensome, I may change to a more passive investment strategy.

Good question Gloria!Annuities follow the interest rate market and depending what kind of annuity you mean, the terms can vary widely.Here are a few thoughts, since the question is a bit generic (feel free to post a follow up question with more details and I will try to add more color!):Immediate annuities - these annuities are “pensionized” annuities. This is when you give the annuity company a lump sum, and in exchange, they pay you monthly for a certain time, up to life or joint life/life + beneficiary. payments from this product will differ based onthe current interest rate environmenthow old you arehow aggressively the insurance company you are considering is going after businessFixed Index Annuities - these were much more attractive after the 2008 crash. Now in my opinion, these aren’t so attractive. This is a fixed product that has options to grow your account based on some factor of how the stock market performs each year. Returns can vary from 0-whatever percent. Currently, in my research, based on product structure, I estimate these products when offered by conservative insurers, could pay out 3–5% annually over a 6–9 year period.Fixed annuities - these are like CDs in that they are products where you deposit your money for a term (3, 4, 5, 7+ years) and earn fixed rate of interest. Though, unlike CDs, these products do not come with FDIC insurance.Variable annuities - these products offer the tax deferred “wrapper” of an annuity but the option to invest in separate accounts which look an awful lot like mutual funds. They are often managed by the mutual fund companies you know well like Fidelity and Oppenheimer. Historically these products had ominous fee structures. Today the market for lower cost “advisor” annuities is heating up to the benefit of the consumer in my opinion.Overall, annuities have historically been SOLD not bought. The only annuities that I would guess have been frequently bought would be the TIAA annuity option available to many educators. because annuities are frequently sold, the product recommended has a risk of being better for the sales agent than the consumer. And that is at least partly where the bad rep for annuities comes in.When you saw the regulators crack down on annuities, it was for that general reason. Nonetheless, hope you found this summary helpful. Here are two further points of reading for you that you might enjoy from my blogs:Annuity Rollover Options - can you transfer or roll over your existing annuityHigh Variable Annuity Fees Problem Fixed with "Advisor" Annuities